‘Pink Panther’ jewel thief wanted over Chelsea heist
WHEN three diamond rings worth £2million were stolen from an art fair in London last summer, police suspected they were looking for more than just an average thief.
However, CCTV images of the raid revealed a rather unremarkable middle-aged man with receding hair and glasses to be the chief suspect.
Scotland Yard have now named the alleged thief as Vinko Osmakcic – a Croatian-born criminal and none other than the head of the infamous “Pink Panther” network – who is believed to have been responsible for some of the most audacious gem heists of the past 25 years.
Using a series of aliases and travelling on fake documents, Osmakcic is suspected of stealing hundreds of millions of pounds worth of jewellery from countries including Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Monaco, Switzerland, Germany and the United States.
His latest haul came in July last year, when he allegedly snatched three diamond rings from a cabinet at the Masterpiece London event held at the Royal Chelsea Hospital.
Scotland Yard has appealed for help to find Osmakcic, but has admitted he may not be in Britain and could be any- where in the world. Even if detectives do track him down, they could face a headache in extraditing him back to face charges.
Det Sgt Chris Taylor, of Kensington and Chelsea CID, said: “This was a well-planned and audacious theft committed in the middle of a busy art fair. We are re-releasing the image of Mr Osmakcic in an attempt to trace him. It is highly likely that [he] may be out of the UK, possibly in Europe.” Police said he could be using the aliases Vinko Tomic or Juro Markelic. Osmakcic and his Pink Panther gang were first identified operating out of Japan in the early Nineties. In 1992, they were suspected of snatching a diamond worth half a million pounds from its display stand at an international jewellery show in Hong Kong and simply walking off with it. The gang was subsequently linked to similar heists across the world, but repeatedly managed to evade capture. In some cases, the gang used smash and grab techniques, while in others they threatened terrified staff with violence.
In 2003, the gang was thought to have pulled off a £23million raid at the Graff jewellery store in London.
It is not clear how many of the Pink Panther raids he was involved in, but in 2010 Osmakcic – who is described as speaking in heavily accented English – was suspected of being part of a gang of four who stole a necklace worth £1million from a jewellery store in Las Vegas. He was arrested seven months later after being spotted by an undercover officer at a jewellery fair in the same city.
In March 2004, he pleaded guilty to theft and was sentenced to one year in prison. But before his sentence was completed he was sent to California, where he was also wanted.
He again pleaded guilty but while he was serving his sentence became the subject of an extradition application
‘It is highly likely that Mr Osmakcic may be out of the UK ... He may also be using aliases’
from the authorities in Hawaii. Osmakcic claimed he had been a soldier in the Bosnian war, but turned to crime to support his displaced family. However, the credibility of his claims are open to question, given that at about the same time his gang was suspected of carrying out raids in Japan
In 2006, he was sentenced to 21 months’ jail in Hawaii, but was released eight months later. Three years later he was detained in Monaco on suspicion of casing out a jewellery store. He was released several months later and subsequently disappeared.